Look youse guys and gals, dat just ain’t right

ABSTRACT

When I invite authors to submit a punctum to Autophagy, my e-mail includes the following: “Note for international authors: I would like to point out that I personally edit all the puncta for accuracy, but also for English grammar and spelling. I make this point to all international authors as I do not want you to worry extensively about the writing. As a native English speaker, it is easy for me to make small changes of this nature.” I do not claim to be an expert in English grammar; however, I am indeed a native English speaker, I read a lot, and I am even fond of using the dictionary (both hard copy and online). Also, I do a lot of editing. Thus, I thought I would share some common mistakes to help reduce the required edits for papers that are submitted to Autophagy.

KEYWORDS:

• Autophagy
• English
• grammar
• spelling
• writing

Let us start with American English. Slang, such as “youse” and “ain’t” are not considered appropriate. In addition, we use standard American English. This is fairly similar to British English, but there are some differences, particularly in spelling. For example, we have the following issues (American/British):

1. “z versus s” as in “analyze/analyse”, “hydrolyze/hydrolyse” and “localize/localise”.

2. “log versus logue” as in “homolog/homologue” and “analog/analogue”.

3. “extra letters” as in:

   1. The extra “a”: “leukemia/leukaemia”, and “ischemia/ischaemia”.

   2. The extra “me”: “program/programme”.

   3. The extra “o”: “estrogen/oestrogen”.

   4. The extra “u”: “color/colour”, “tumor/tumour”, and “behavior/behaviour”.

   5. The extra “st”: “among/amongst”.

4. “Reversed letters” as in “center/centre” and “fiber/fibre”.

5. “Alternate letters” as in “gray/grey”, and “while/whilst”.

Fortunately, we do not need to concern ourselves with uncommon (from the American point of view) Britishisms such as “whingeing” or “chuffed” as these rarely come up in scientific papers, although they may apply to different people’s perceptions about this article, depending on their sense of humor.

Published data are written in the present tense, whereas current data should be written in the past tense. Part of the idea here is that the published data are facts that are still true (ignoring issues with incorrect data), whereas the current data have not yet been verified. Thus, “Klionsky et al. showed that Atg32 is a receptor for mitophagy [19]. In the present report we found that a mutation in Atg57 resulted in a defect in both mitophagy and the Cvt pathway (Figure 1).”

Don’t use contractions in formal scientific writing. Oops, I meant to say, do not use contractions. Also, do not start sentences with Arabic numerals but spell them out. Thus, “Twenty hours of treatment … ”, not “20 h of treatment … ” versus “Cells were treated for 20 h … ”

Parentheses () are used first, then square brackets []. Thus, “Lysis buffer (50 mM Tris-HCl, pH 7.4, 1% sodium deoxycholate [company, catalog number], 1% Triton X-100 [company, catalog number]).” If an additional layer of separation is needed, use curly brackets {}. The one exception to this rule is for official HGNC, MGI, etc. definitions. In this case, the parentheses are part of the name, so we use parentheses within parentheses. For example, “HSPD1 (heat shock protein family D (Hsp60) member 1)” instead of “HSPD1 (heat shock protein family D [Hsp60] member 1)”.

Use a slash for equivalency as in “Atg1/ULK1” but not for a protein-protein interaction as in “ULK1/ATG13”; the latter should be written as “ULK1-ATG13” [1].

To qualify for an abbreviation, the word should be used at least three times. That is, there is no need to write, “paraformaldehyde (PFA)” if you only refer to it once in the paper. If you refer to the word only twice, spell it out completely both times. That said, some abbreviations are better known/more easily recognized than the full spelling. Thus, rather than using parentheses, which indicate an official abbreviation, use a slash, which, as mentioned above, indicates equivalency as in “Amyotrophic lateral sclerosis/ALS” if the abbreviation is only being used once or twice. In addition, at Autophagy we ask authors to use official gene/protein nomenclature [2]. Authors should use official gene/protein symbols first, then the definition in parentheses as in “ULK1 (unc51-like autophagy activating kinase 1)” because “ULK1” is an official gene/protein symbol. In contrast, “AMPK” is an abbreviation for a complex. Accordingly, this should be written as “5ʹ adenosine monophosphate-activated protein kinase (AMPK)” upon the first use, then “AMPK” subsequently (if you use it three or more times, as you would know if you have been paying attention).

Unnecessary use of “respectively”: I see people using “respectively” to refer to multiple conditions; however, this is not necessary if these conditions all apply to a single system. For example, “HeLa cells were treated with 10, 20 or 30 µg of bafilomycin A₁, respectively.” There is no need for “respectively” because only one type of cell is being referred to; it is implied that different concentrations were used for different individual cell cultures. Instead, “HeLa and MCF-7 cells were treated with 10 or 30 µg of rapamycin, respectively” indicates that 10 µg were used for the HeLa cells, whereas 30 µg were used for the MCF-7 cells.

To dash or not to dash? Is it correct to write “50-µm sections” or “50 µm sections”? The first means sections of 50 microns thickness, whereas the second means 50 sections of a micron thickness. Similarly, there is a difference between “6–8 weeks old mice” and “6- to 8-weeks-old mice”. The former refers to the use of 6 to 8 individual mice that were weeks old (not clear how many weeks), whereas the latter means a certain number of mice that were between 6 and 8 weeks of age. Finally, the phrase “96 well plates” might be considered poor grammar for “96 good plates” or “96 not too bad plates”, when you probably meant “96-well plates” as in a plate with 96 wells.

Hand-bidextrous: Another somewhat controversial issue concerns the use of “On the other hand”. At Autophagy, we follow the rule that this phrase should only be used after “On the one hand”. Some people argue that “On the one hand” is implied using “On the other hand”. However, writing “On the one hand” helps clarify the point at which the dichotomy is being established, rather than forcing the reader to back up and look for it. If you do not want to start with “On the one hand”, use “In contrast” instead of “On the other hand”.

A common error I see is the incorrect use of “identified” as in “We identified that Atg72 is a transcription factor that regulates the expression of Atg58”. Instead, this should be “We determined that … ” or “We discovered that … ”, etc. “Identified” means you have established who or what something is rather than what it does. Thus, “We identified the large yeast as being Melinda, and her neighbor as Vik. We determined that Melinda was eating a lot, whereas Vik was spending too much time working out at the yeast gym.”

An interesting problematic phrase is the use of “In consistence with”. As written, this phrase is at the very least confusing. The first two words could be combined as “Inconsistent with”. That is, “inconsistent” as one word would be the more common usage; however, does the author mean “inconsistent with” or “consistent with”? That is, what was the author trying to convey when writing “In consistence with”? In general, from the papers I have edited, the author means “consistent with”, which can be determined from the context of the sentence. These two interpretations have the opposite meaning, so it is important to use “consistent with” rather than “in consistence with”.

“Since/because” and “while/whereas” are often used interchangeably. “Since” refers to a period of time as in “Although watched carefully, the yeast did not move since 1:00”. In contrast, “because” means “for the reason” as in “The yeast did not move because they were lazy”. These words are used synonymously, and accordingly we do not insist that authors use one or the other, but I think it is worth keeping these differences in mind if your goal is to write in as clear a manner as possible. Similarly, “while” refers to a period of time as in “I got sleepy while waiting for the yeast to move”. “Whereas” is used to compare and contrast as in “I got sleepy waiting for the yeast to move, whereas my colleague was excited watching the fencing match”.

A couple of word options that I find hard to keep straight are “independent/independently” and “similar/similarly”. “Independent” and “similar” are adjectives, which are used to modify nouns and pronouns, whereas (note the contrast) “independently” and “similarly” are adverbs, which are used to modify a verb. Thus, “The independent scientist” versus “He worked independently”, or “A similar experiment” versus “Both approaches worked similarly.”

Two final points: 1) Remember that “western blot” refers to a technique, not to a person, which distinguishes it from “Southern blot”; accordingly, “western” should be written in lowercase letters [3]. 2) Avoid needless variants. Thus, use “biological” instead of “biologic” (unless you are referring to a manufactured product as a “biologic”), “physiological” instead of “physiologic”, etc. [4].

So, whaddya think? Don’t these explanations make it a heck of a lot easier to write good?

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by the National Institute of General Medical Sciences [GM131919].